Here at Defamer, we usually announce the latest Hollywood projects in our trade round-up, but today's Variety included mention of an upcoming project that was so balls-out bizarre, we knew it needed special attention. According to the industry bible, Wanted helmer Timur Bekmambetov is prepping an adaptation of Herman Meville's Moby Dick. Naturally, as befits a project of this sort of literary stature, he has brought aboard writers Adam Cooper and Bill Collage (who previously scripted the Justin Long comedy Accepted) to draft the screenplay. Says Variety:

The writers revere Melville’s original text, but their graphic novel-style version will change the structure. Gone is the first-person narration by the young seaman Ishmael, who observes how Ahab’s obsession with killing the great white whale overwhelms his good judgment as captain.

This change will allow them to depict the whale’s decimation of other ships prior to its encounter with Ahab’s Pequod, and Ahab will be depicted more as a charismatic leader than a brooding obsessive. "Our vision isn’t your grandfather’s ‘Moby Dick,’ " Cooper said. "This is an opportunity to take a timeless classic and capitalize on the advances in visual effects to tell what at its core is an action-adventure revenge story."

And what, pray tell, was wrong with our grandfather's Dick? Ahem, that didn't come out right. All we're saying is that between Bekmambetov's Moby Dick and Brett Ratner's planned adaptation of Guitar Hero, we're not sure what to expect anymore. Will we wake up to the Hollywood Reporter announcing Michael Bay's Shamwow!, or perhaps a whimsical, Wes Anderson-directed adaptation of Mein Kampf? (Jason Schwartzman, call your agent.)